The Minority in
Parliament is calling on the government to completely de-cap the Road Fund,
allowing it to solely finance road projects and pay contractor debts.
According to the
minority, it will support the reinstatement of road tolls only if the government
accepts its suggestion.
It comes on the
back of the proposed increase in rates following government’s decision to
reintroduce road tolls after abolishing the collection in 2021.
The Earmarked
Funds Capping and Realignment Act, 2017 (Act 947) of the constitution gives the
finance minister the authority to commit a portion of road tolls to the Road
Fund managed by the Ministry of Roads and Highways and use the remainder for
other purposes.
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“The only way
the Minority will be interested in this discussion at all, is to get an
assurance that the road fund will totally be de-capped so that the numerous
contractors who have worked and whose certificates are lying in the Ministry
and other agencies will have the ability to get their monies paid to them so
that they can be back to site to fix roads. We are not going to support
government to bring the toll back if it will only bring GHS 2.4 billion and
then only GH¢1 billion is used for roads and the remainder used for the
National Cathedral, we will not be part of this.”
Meanwhile,
Chairman of Parliament’s Roads and Highways Committee in Parliament, Kennedy
Osei Nyarko wants road tolls pegged at GH¢5.
Kennedy Osei
Nyarko believes that setting the toll at GH¢5 will help the government generate
more revenue for the country.
He was speaking
to journalists about the government’s proposed reintroduction of road tolls and
said only that amount of money will be considered as the toll rate.
“After
suspending the road tolls for more than a year, why do we just add 50 pesewas
to it? As the Roads Committee Chair, I will not support anything less than
GH¢5. I am doing that based on the average road toll in the subregion and
globally which is $1.”
The government
has revised the schedules of the Fees and Charges (Miscellaneous Provisions)
Act, 2022, (Act 1080).
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The amendments
are in line with the government’s intention to restart collecting tolls on some
roads pending the completion of the steps to identify the roads and highways to
be affected by the reintroduction of the tolls.
To this end, the
Ministry of Finance has commenced the procedures, necessary to determine the
toll foundation rates while the Ministry of Roads and Highways considers them.
The proposed
rates have witnessed an average increase of 88 percent from the previous
charges.
The Finance
Ministry in a statement said, “we are by this letter sending the recommended
rates for input by the Ministry of Roads and Highways to enable this Ministry
to finalize the schedule of fees under the upcoming Legislative Instrument”.
The Minority in
parliament had been advocating for the reintroduction of road tolls arguing
that the cessation was not financially sustainable, especially since the
government is struggling to raise revenue.
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